Minnesota wolf hunters registered 32 wolves Saturday in the first day of the inaugural wolf season. That's with 3,600 licensed hunters. The early-season quota is 200.
Sixteen were registered in the northeast zone, twelve in the northwest and four in the east-central zone.
Hunters who bagged a wolf on Saturday had until 10 p.m.to register it.
The tally was well below the quota for two of the three wolf zones. Hunters bagged four wolves in the east-central zone, which has a quota of just nine wolves. In the northeast, the quota is 58 and in the northwest it's 133.
Meanwhile, I spent five hours Saturday with a DNR conservation officer driving backroads in the Ely-Tower area. Officer Dan Starr checked about a dozen hunters, but none had shot a deer or a wolf. In fact, none of the hunters he checked had wolf licenses.
"The deer aren't moving today because it's so nice out," Stark said. "And when deer move, the wolves move. I think there'll be more activity in the next few days."
We'll see what Day Two brings on Sunday.
